The White Knight
by The Unreliable Rescue
Summary: Movie-Verse  Some magic will stay with you, but only if you let it. Ron deals with the effects of the Horcrux while searching for his friends.


A few things first: **This story was written as a reaction to the new movie _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1_.** I'm well aware that Ron spent his time away from his friends getting caught by Snatchers, escaping, searching, then spending the remainder of his time at Shell Cottage in the book; but the books are different from the movies.

Un-beta'd as of now, so all mistakes are my own.

Disclaimer: The characters from _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows_ are licensed to Warner Bros. Entertainment and J.K. Rowling. I'm grateful that they both have a good sense of humor that allows us fanfiction writers to use their characters :)

* * *

If one was particularly miserable and dead-set on making himself even more miserable than before, he would probably take a walk alone down the streets of London on a rigidly cold December night. He would trudge past the closed shops where the Christmas decorations have overstayed their welcome, past the golden lights spilling onto the streets from the crowded pubs, away from all the hubbub of business people and up-and-comers having a good drunken time. He would continue walking for a long, long, time until his toes were frozen and his hands were numb. Just when he'd think that he'd crossed the wrong street and entered the Unsavory Part of the city, this miserable wretched man would look up and see a wooden sign for the Yellow Dog Pub. Green polluted light would shine weakly from the inside onto the gray slushed streets and the pathetically unhappy man would think to himself "Finally, a ghastly place to suit my ghastly mood."

Upon entering he would be greeted by an indoor heater and a long room, bar on the left, small round tables with ugly antique lighting fixtures on the right. An oldies station would be playing softly in the background on which The Rolling Stones would lament that you can't always get what you want, but oh, if you tried sometimes you just might, you _just might_ get what you need. From behind the counter the bartender would look up from his sweeping at the newcomer without interest, then go right back to his sweeping. If the woefully dejected man happened to come to the Yellow Dog on a specific December night at a particular time, there would be two patrons at the bar: an old man snoozing in front of a half-played game of chess on one of the round tables, looking very drunk but very content, and a hulking young man with broad shoulders, long limbs, and an even longer face at the far end of the bar.

"Just my kind of people," the miserable man would think without any cheer as he sat down at the bar. He would order a glass of whiskey and watch the red-headed boy from the corner of his eye. He might think to himself "Man, that kid looks like he's even more depressed than I am. Maybe I should talk to him." But misery drinks alone and bumbling cowardice would stop the unhappy newcomer from saying anything to the boy. He would drink himself into a sludge-like stupor and by the end of the night would be thinking to himself "Well it could always be worse. I could be miserable _and _a red-head." And he would never say anything to anyone except the bartender for the rest of the night.

Incidentally sitting in silence was exactly what the red-haired young man, who happened to be named Ronald Weasley, wanted to do. Sitting in lonely pubs was something he'd been doing a lot lately, and it was something he was becoming very good at. He would travel during the day, his duffel bag slung over his good shoulder, searching for the tiniest clue about _anything_, the horcruxes, Voldemort, Harry, Hermione… At night he would find a relatively empty out of the way hole-in-the-wall where he would slowly drink himself to sleep. Ron didn't know what the drinking age for Muggles was, or if they even had one, but he apparently looked old enough, physically and mentally, to deserve a few glasses without question. While he drank he would keep a sharp ear on the television and the radio but since this was the Muggle world there wasn't a whole lot of news to be heard. Strange disappearances, random murders, the Bristol Rovers just traded a player in a controversial move to build their team; none of it was what Ron really wanted to hear.

_To be honest,_ Ron thought to himself not for the first time, _I'm not even sure what I'm listening for. "Lord Voldemort Defeated"? "The Weasley Family is Fine and Being Decorated by the Ministry of Magic for Heroic Bravery"? "Harry Potter and Hermione Granger Discovered the Spell for World Peace and We Can All Go Home Now"? _He smiled ruefully. If any two wizards could discover the key for world peace, it would be his two best friends.

_Well… sort of best friends_. Despite popular opinion Ronald Weasley wasn't a stupid man. He knew what he'd done was pretty high up on the list of Unforgivable Actions Between Friends. He would have to do a _lot _of groveling-like-a-dog and begging for forgiveness if he ever hoped to even _speak_ to Harry again (his hopes of ever talking to Hermione again were even slimmer). Not for the first time Ron wished he'd just gone back immediately after he'd left that little tent in East England Nowhere. He could have walked in with arms wide open, "Sorry I'm such a twat, please forgive me," and everything would have gone back to the way it was.

_The way it was_… Ron grimaced and polished off the last of his drink. He banged it on the counter a too loudly, although he'd just meant to get the bartender's attention. Instead the old man woke up with a loud snort while the man behind the counter jumped and dropped his dust-pan on the ground, causing all of his hard work to go to waste. The bartender was a medium sized dark man in his late thirties with black eyes and an imposing mustache, the kind that made Ron's dark orange scruff look like peach-fuzz. He was perfect for bar tending late nights since his "no-shit-no-service" attitude kept most people in line.

He glared at Ron for a moment before striding over purposefully. "The same?" he asked with as much warmth as a shaved polar bear in the Arctic winter. Ron nodded, his mind warring between his mother's stern voice "You must always be polite," and his own "Fuck it, I'm tired of this," mantra. The resulting facial expression resembled a particularly ugly bulldog trying to smile.

The bartender gave him a hard look before taking the glass and refilling it. "Here you go." Ron accepted the glass gratefully and the man behind the bar returned to his cleaning.

_Well_, Ron thought to himself, raising his glass to nobody. _Here's to world peace. _He finished the drink in silence, his gloom rising in relation the glass emptying. _The way it was…_ he would think to himself, remembering the long hours in that god-forsaken tent wrapped up in a cot and listening to the radio. "Five more attacks today… The Minister ensures that he's doing his best to…"

The Horcrux locket would dangle around his neck like an anvil, evil thoughts burning into his skull. _At least they're doing something, you're just a useless lump. No wonder she likes him more than you, he's always finding the right way to do things while you just bumble your way through everything. It's like your mother always said Ron, you'll never amount to anything if you don't get off your rear and do something, and guess what? She was right. You've amounted to nothing. You might as well just lie here and waste away forever. Or even better, why don't you take this radio cord, make a loop, and tie it to the top of the tree outside…_

_Well I'll show you_, he thought to himself. _I'm not gonna sit here and do nothing. I'm going to keep drinking like a champ. Fred and George would be so freaking proud of me… _

Hermione would be furious.

_Who cares?_ But even in his alcoholic haze Ron knew he cared. He cared _a lot_. It drove him crazy how much he cared. It was a constant thought, a continuous frame of mind: what would Hermione think? It was entirely unfair how much just thinking about one stupid girl could control so much about him; how he dressed, how he studied, how he talked, how he thought. It was unfair of the world to put him in a tent alone with the stupid girl for months with no one around but his best friend... _But a lot of things are unfair_, he thought bitterly.

Suddenly the seventeen year-old couldn't sit still. Sitting still would make it too easy to think, and that was the one thing Ron did not appreciate about his new-found "alone time." Ron finished his glass and slid off the barstool with a little less grace that usual. _Gotta keep moving,_ he thought as he hefted his back pack onto his shoulder. He slammed some Muggle money he'd gotten from Hermione down on the counter, earning another glare from the mustached bartender.

"On your way home?" the old man in the corner asked in a slight Russian accent as Ron passed him. Ron looked down at him; he was a very small man, made smaller by age, with a big nose and a gray beard that hid his serious smile. His brown eyes looked tired, but they still had a light in them that reminded Ron of Dumbledore and his unwillingness to back down from life. _Until they killed him…_ the young red-head thought, but he quickly brushed that aside. There was too much gunpowder behind that thought for him to give it a spark.

Instead Ron noticed the old man's travel chessboard in front of him. "Were you playing yourself?"

The old man shrugged. "To a degree yes. I played with a man earlier who beat me. I'm trying to retrace my steps so it doesn't happen again." He and Ron studied the board for a moment, each one trying to figure out the best move.

"Did you try moving your bishop to b5?" Ron asked finally.

The old man slowly sat up in his chair as if discovering a hidden clue for the first time and not believing it. "That's it! How could I have been so blind?"

Ron smiled, the expression feeling foreign on his face. "Glad I could help," he said, readjusting his bag.

"Wait, wait," the old man looked up, his voice gruff but his eyes sparkling. "You can't _leave._ Here I have finally found a worthy opponent, and you would cheat me of a game?"

"Now?"

"You're not going to be here tomorrow." It wasn't a question, it was a statement of fact.

The young man hesitated, anxious to keep going, but he could hear the cold wind picking up outside the window.

"I tell you what," the old Russian continued. "You play now, I buy you a drink. You win, and I buy you another."

The wind practically howled outside of the pub, sending a cold chill down Ron's back. As much as his teenage hormones told him to keep moving, Ron had to admit that he didn't have anywhere to really _go._ If he knew how he could find Harry and Hermione that would be another story altogether. But since he didn't… "Alright, black or white?"

The Russian grinned, revealing a mouth full of brown and yellow teeth that had been abused by too many years of drinking and smoking. "I'll be black."

"Fine with me," Ron replied. He sat down and let his bag slip off his shoulder with a soft thud, helping the old man set up the board.

The old man motioned to the bartender who looked mildly annoyed that the giant red-head hadn't left yet. "Two Russian cocoas." The bartender seemed to sigh a little, making the hairs of his large black moustache float up in resignation. The old man waved his hand and turned to his new chess opponent. "What's your name?" he asked.

"Stan Shunpike," the young man replied. He'd picked up the habit of giving people the wrong name, just in case they were the unsavory types. _You can never be too careful_.

The old Russian nodded solemnly. "My name is Nikolai Ivanov."

"Good to meet you Nikolai."

Nikolai grunted as he set the last piece. "Now that I know the name of the man I will defeat, let us play. Your turn first."

Ron had to stop himself from calling out his first move like he would have at home. Pieces didn't magically move in Muggle he cleared his throat and said "You're awfully confident." He moved his white pawn out to e4. "Weren't you saying you were beaten today?"

"Bah, he was a cheat." The old Russian moved his pawn to meet Ron's. "And he was ugly."

"Is'sat so?" _White knight to c3_.

"You would be better looking than him if it weren't for that hair of yours."

At this point the bartender came around to the table with two steaming mugs of rich hot chocolate. Ron's mouth salivated at the sight; it'd been a long time since he'd had something like hot chocolate. As simple as it was, the hot beverage seemed like something he should be sharing with his friends in front of the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room. Even drinking it now seemed like a betrayal to Harry and Hermione who were god-knows-where trying to save the world while he sat in a cozy pub drinking hot cocoa and playing chess. Ron took a careful sip. _Hopefully someday we'll be together again on a cold night like this drinking mom's hot- _Suddenly it occurred to Ron why Nikolai had called this "Russian" cocoa. "What the hell? There's alcohol in this!"

The tiny old man laughed loudly, clutching his pot-belly stomach in mirth. "Not man enough for a little hot chocolate boy?" he managed to choke out through gafaws.

Ron could feel his ears turning pink. "I was just a little surprised, that's all." He took another gulp, even though the drink was still too hot. He fought back tears as he said "It's not exactly my mom's recipe."

Nikolai grinned at the young man. "I was raised on this. Maybe next time you can show your mother how to do it right, eh? A little vodka never hurt anyone."

Ron smiled again, the expression feeling more and more natural. It occurred to him that normally this rude old man might intimidate him, but he was either too drunk or too tired to care anymore. Besides chess was Ron's stomping ground; nothing could intimidate him here._ Almost nothing anyway_, he thought, remembering the game he'd played in the depths of Hogwarts. He turned his attention back to Nikolai and the board. "You know my entire family has red hair?"

"My deepest sympathies. Now where were we?"

"You're just jealous cause I get all the girls mate," he replied as Nikolai moved his own Black Knight with his knobby white hands.

"Ha! You wish!" The old Russian barked surprisingly loud for being such a small man. "Red heads never get the girl, only sissy blonde boys do."

Ron didn't reply. He moved his Bishop to c4.

Nikolai raised a thin gray eyebrow. "I see. When I called you a worthy opponent, I was not just kidding then. Where did you learn to play?"

"My older brother," Ron replied, not specifying which one. "It took me a while, but finally I started kicking his arse in every game we played."

"Hmm," the old man replied. "He was a good teacher then."

"Nah, I'm just that good."

"Ha! We will see about that!"

It appeared that it was now time for Serious Business as the two men matched wits in relative silence for the next hour. The only words exchanged were the occasional good-natured insult from Nikolai and a sarcastic retort from Ron.

It felt good for the young man to get his mind off of things for a change. Alcohol never did anything but numb Ron's thoughts until it was too weak to fight off the bad memories. The last thoughts he would have before falling asleep would be the things the Horcrux told him. _You're lost. You're worthless. Your best friend never needed you to be anything more than his comic relief. She never saw you as anything more than an annoying kid brother. She will never love you. Go ahead, die of a broken heart, you'll be doing the world a favor. You betrayed your friends and they've moved on. _Sometimes it would invade his dreams and he wouldn't be able to sleep for the loud echo in his head. _!_

But with chess, that was different. Chess required his mind to work. With chess Ron could see everything. He could see all the possible moves, all the possible endings. He didn't mind taking some risks in a game because he _knew_ what he was doing. Every move he made had a meaning to it. He never had to wait for something to happen, he never had to blindly react to the events around him. For the first time in a long time Ron felt like he was in control of something, even if it was only a tiny plastic figurine.

The match ended with Ron knocking out Nikolai's King with one of his Bishops.

"Aha! That was a good game my friend," Nikolai announced with a broad smile. "Come, let's play another!"

"Another?" Ron looked at the spry old man skeptically. "It's one in the morning."

The old Russian waved his hand dismissively. "This place does not close for two hours. I will refill your mug and we will play again."

"Plan on getting me too drunk to play huh?"

Nikolai shrugged. "It may have crossed my mind."

Ron threw up his hands in defeat. "Alright, you got me. But you're paying."

"I said I would, didn't I?" the old man defended, motioning to the bartender for another two mugs. "But this time I will play white."

Two mugs and two hours later the two were still staring hard at the cheap black and white game board. It was Ron's turn at the moment and he had been studying the pieces with his chin in his hand for a good three minutes. _Gotta give it to the old man, he knows what he's doing. _He looked up briefly at his opponent; Nikolai was quickly beginning to fade. His wrinkled eye-lids drooped dangerously and he kept resting his chin on his chest. _Must be the booze,_ Ron thought, turning his attention back to the board.

"You take too long." The old man's accent had gotten much thicker as the night wore on. "You think too much and you take too long. Just do something already."

"I'm working on it," Ron grumbled in return.

"You work on it too long, I will fall asleep on you," was Nikolai's garbled response.

"Hey, guys," the bartender said gruffly. "I'm closing up here."

"Yeah, yeah, hang on," Ron waved away the bartender's warning without taking his eyes off the board. The old man had really backed him into a corner this time. The only reasonable move would be Knight to d7 but if he did that then Nikolai's Queen would take him out… Ah ha! There it was! "Bishop to g5."

A loud snore erupted from Ron's opponent; the old man's chin rested on his chest as he dozed off in the chair.

Ron stared at the old man for a moment; should he let him sleep and call it quits? But the bar was closing, what the heck was he supposed to do, just leave Nikolai? "Hey," he said in a hushed voice that one only uses around sleeping people. "Hey." He reached over and poked the Russian in the shoulder.

"It's no use kid." The bartender had come around to grab their mugs. "He does this all the time. He comes in here, drinks, and falls asleep on me like a bum. So," he continued, "It's usually up to me to drag his sorry arse back home."

The seventeen-year-old glanced at the man sitting across from him. "How far away does he live?"

The bartender motioned upwards with a nod. "He's in the flat upstairs."

"Well that's not too far then…"

"Humph." The man gave him a dark look that could put out light bulbs. "You want to do it then hot shot? He's heavier than he looks."

Ron seemed at a loss for words before he shrugged. "Yeah sure, I guess," he mumbled. He stood up but had to grasp the table for balance; the combination of Russian cocoa and the natural head rush he would get occasionally from being so tall nearly wiped him off his feet.

"Watch yourself there big guy," the bartender warned. "Just leave the chess board." He tossed a set of two keys at Ron who barely caught them. "Those are for his flat. You go outside and there's a door on the left. Make sure he gets into bed, I don't want him dying from the cold up there. It'll stink the place up."

_Lovely people here, really_, Ron thought as he walked over to Nikolai. The old Russian woke up enough to realize what was happening as Ron attempted to put Nikolai's arm around his shoulder and neck. "We going home?"

"Yeah, it's closing time mate. I'm taking you home." Ron replied, pulling the old man to his feet. The old man was so small that the red-head had to stoop so that Nikolai wouldn't be dangling uncomfortably off the ground.

"Ja, ja..." the old man seemed to drift off back to sleep even though he kept shuffling his feet. Ron carefully reached down and grabbed his duffel bag before half dragging his new friend out of the pub.

Outside the streets were quiet and dimly lit. The absence of people seemed to make the air colder to Ron, but at least the wind had finally died. The key to the stairwell was stubborn and hard to turn since the metal had frozen in place, and once Ron had opened the door the inside seemed colder than the outside. It took the chess players some time to get to the top of the landing since Ron was still suffering from alcohol induced motion sickness and Nikolai seemed to be dancing a half-waking jig up the stairs he called "The Rum Shuffle." When they'd finally reached the landing Ron had dropped the keys, and he spent the next five minutes shuffling around the stairs in the dark before discovering Nikolai had forgotten to lock his flat altogether.

"Get light before we go in," Nikolai commanded. Ron looked around for light switches unsuccessfully before he reached into his pocket and flipped open the Deluminator, giving life to the dim, yellowed lights in the room. Nikolai said nothing about the sudden light show, instead shuffling over to a large well-used chair, the kind Ron imagined grandmothers kept in their basement since they were too ashamed to use it in their living rooms. The old man sank down into the chair with a loud groan, as though sitting was an effort.

Ron looked around the small flat, feeling nostalgic and sick at the same time. There was a threadbare carpet beneath Nikolai's chair that looked like it had seen better days until a mole might have decided to make it's nest there. Next to the chair was a dark wooden table containing a small lamp, a paperback version of _The Brothers Karamazov _in Russian, and two faded photographs set in antique frames. This table served as both a coffee table and a nightstand for the single person bed in the opposite corner of the room. The mattress was yellow and piled high with woolen blankets the way Ron and his brothers used to pile blankets when making forts. A miniature stove shoved into a closet on the opposite wall with dusty pantry shelves above it suggested that the old Russian didn't do a lot of cooking for himself. On the wall next to the kitchen/closet were two cabinets, which Ron imagined, contained instant meals and a lot of liquor. Behind Nikolai's chair was a broom closet, although upon closer inspection Ron realized it was actually a bathroom.

_It reminds me of that stupid tent we were staying in_, the young man thought.

Nikolai had woken up a little and grabbed a blanket from the bed. "You stay here tonight," he said gruffly, wrapping the blanket around his wiry shoulders. "You will sleep in bed, I sleep here."

Ron readjusted his duffle bag on his shoulder and shuffled awkwardly in the doorway. "No, I can't do that…"

"Where else will you sleep tonight, eh?" the old man asked. "Come, pour us glass of whiskey and we go to sleep."

"No really, I'm fi-"

"You are not fine," Nikolai said, louder than necessary. "Any fool can see that."

The young man held the old man's gaze for a moment, a silent battle of wills occurring even though they both knew how it would end. Finally Ron sighed and let his bag fall to the floor before heading over to the cabinet. "Glasses in here?"

"Ja."

Ron opened the cabinet revealing two glasses, one bowl, two boxes of cereal, and a _lot_ of liquor. "You really need to get some decent food mate," he said as he pulled out the glasses and handed one to Nikolai.

"Hmph. Is mother's milk," the old Russian responded.

The two sat together in silence, drinking the whiskey slowly. Ron reclined on the bed and studied the photographs on the table to keep his mind busy. It was strange to Ron that the photos didn't move at all, but he felt like if he stared at them long enough he could see something.

The photo on the left was a picture of two women, one old and bent with age, the other young with dark braided hair. Neither one was smiling. The other portrayed a young man in a Russian uniform, proud and in his prime, a large handlebar moustache sprouted over his upper lip. Ron stroked his face absently, wondering what he would look like if he grew out a proper moustache while he looked at the photos.

"You look deep in thought boy," Nikolai muttered.

"Just wondering what I'd look like with more facial hair," Ron replied. "I tried it once, but my sister said I looked like I had a lip ferret."

Nikolai barked out a laugh. "Ja, moustaches are tricky tings," he said. "My sister said I look like monster." After that he seemed to remember something and became very quiet.

Ron looked at the old man nervously; he recognized a funk when he saw one. "So," he said in an effort to distract the Russian, "Is that you in this one?"

Nikolai leaned over to see the old military photo. "Ja, that is me." He sank back into his chair with a heavy sigh. "I fought in World War II, back when Stalin was in power."

Ron didn't say anything, waiting for the old man to explain; god knew he never paid attention in Wizard History Class, how the heck was he supposed to keep track of Muggle history?

"It was… dark time for us," Nikolai continued. "But you never know it from the way our soldiers talked. We were proud Soviets. We kill many, many Germans."

The seventeen year-old was starting to feel uncomfortable. The last thing he'd really wanted to hear was a war story. "And that picture," he asked quickly, heading off any tales of heroic German killing, "was that your family?"

Nikolai nodded. "My mother was Polish; my father was Russian. He died when I was young. For long time I took care of the family, but we were very poor. Job in army paid well, so I became proud solider." The old man adjusted himself in his seat and took another drink of his whiskey. "When war was over I was placed in special regiment. We invaded homes of traitors, Polish spies, sent them away on trains to places far, far away." Nikolai laughed humorously. "Funny how many spies were women and children."

Ron gulped. In his mind's eye he could see the dark halls of the Ministry of Magic lined with Muggle-born wizards and witches, scared and paranoid, constantly looking over their shoulders for _something_. Suddenly he wished he were drinking something other than alcohol. "So," he managed to choke out. "Where's your family?"

Nikolai's face turned dark. "Dead. I think. One day I come home and soldiers are posted outside my village. I tried to get inside, but it was no use. The village had been purged of Polish spies." He swung back the rest of his drink and grimaced. "Ahh. Yes. My sister was married to Polish doctor. He was probably taken away and she was too. I don't know what happened to my mother."

"I see." Ron could picture it very clearly; the door would have been blasted open, dark figures with weapons pouring inside, dragging out a man with dark hair and glasses and a fiery young woman with red hair while her mother screamed and cried, helpless to do anything but watch.

He felt like he was going to be sick.

"I left soon after," Nikolai said, snuggling down further into his chair. "I was still half-Polish, even though I'd been faithful _tovarishch_ for many years."

Ron put down his glass on the table. The alcohol in his body and in his mind was making him feel dizzy and he had to fight to keep it down. "Your brother-in-law," he said slowly. "He wasn't a spy, was he?" It was more of a statement than a question.

Nikolai sighed. "I do not know. But Masha was no spy. That much I know."

A mental movie of a red-haired girl being blasted out of the door by a sick green light was playing in Ron's mind. There was a ringing in his ears that was getting louder and louder and no matter how he tried it wouldn't go away. "Why didn't you stop it?"

The old Russian snapped around to glare at Ron, fire in his tired brown eyes. Something made him stop; instead he stared at the young man sitting on his bed, searching his face for something, although Ron didn't know what. At this point the world around him was beginning to spin.

Nikolai sighed, defeated. He sank back in his chair and pulled the blanket up to his chin. "I did not trust myself to know best. I trusted my superiors when I should have trusted myself." He looked at Ron again, his face looking more tired than it had all night. "I did not trust myself, and I regret it every day." The old man turned away from the boy. "Turn off light before you sleep."

Ron blinked, the ringing in his ears slowly dying. He reached into his pocket and flicked the Deluminator before lying on the bed and trying to sleep.

That night he had nightmares. He was watching his friends and families pile into small train cars, each one sad and scared looking. He watched Hermione climb inside, crying from fear as Harry helped her up. Ron didn't say anything. Before he got inside Harry turned around and looked straight at Ron, his brilliant green eyes begging his best friend silently to _do something_. Ron couldn't move. If he did he might fall, and he didn't want to fall, not in front of everyone. But Harry needed his help, and he had to do something. Ron lifted up his arm, clad in the same uniform he'd seen Nikolai wear in his old photo, raised his wand and said the spell that would end it all.

_Avada Kedar_-

"NO!"

Ron shot up, his clothes from last night sticking to him in a cold sweat. He was panicking; he didn't know where he was, how he'd gotten there, all he wanted was to get back to Harry-

"Stan! Stan! Is alright!"

Ron looked around wildly, finally seeing Nikolai standing in front of him, his arms held up as though he was protecting himself from the crazed teenager.

"Ni- Nikolai?"

"Ja, it is me," the old man replied. "You have been sleeping all day. It is almost night-time now."

Ron looked at the old man, comprehension finally coming back to him. Suddenly last night hit his gut like a train hitting a deer. The young man tore from the bed and ran into the bathroom, successfully puking up anything he'd eaten in the last day.

When he was done he groaned and slid back against the bathroom wall. "Fuck, I feel awful," he moaned.

"You had too much to drink last night, eh?" Nikolai said. "And you seemed to have had a bad dream."

Ron closed his eyes, green explosions going off behind his eyelids. "Yeah, something like that."

"You must have been dreaming about losing that chess game to me." Nikolai's face betrayed his thoughts; he knew what Ron had been dreaming about. But his bad attempt at humor provoked a brief smile from the boy anyway.

Nikolai shrugged. "I'll go out and get you some food from the bar. Oh," he said as he pulled on his jacket. "Probably something for that hangover, ja?" With a roaring laugh that made Ron nearly throw up again Nikolai left the flat, banging the door behind him.

Ron sat there on the floor for a while longer, waiting just in case any more of his lunch decided to reappear. When the coast was clear he dragged himself up by the sink, catching a glance of himself in the mirror; his eyes were as red as his hair and pieces of vomit were stuck in his growing beard. _Hmm. Welcome to a new low Ronald Weasley. _He splashed some cold water on his face and wiped it with his shirt (which was thankfully puke free).

Ron slumped over to the cabinet to try and find a glass for water, realizing once again just how much alcohol Nikolai had. _Jesus, I'm surprised his liver hasn't killed him earlier._ He grabbed an empty glass and walked back to the bathroom sink to fill it up.

_Ron._

The teenager paused with the glass under the facet. _What was that?_

_Ron._

Someone was saying his name, he was sure of it. _What the hell is going on_? Suddenly the water glass caught his attention again as the dirty sink water overflowed onto his hands and his shirtsleeve. Cursing he quickly turned off the tap and shook the water off. "Yeah, this is exactly what I need-"

He turned around and stopped. Harry was there, standing in the doorway.

"H-Harry?" Ron heard his voice crack, but he didn't really care. Harry looked tired and cold, but at least he was _alive, _at least he was _whole._ Ron felt a huge grin growing on his face as he went to embrace his best friend. "Harry! Blimey man, it's good to see you! I've been looking-"

"Don't get excited Ron," Harry cut him off.

Ron stopped dead in his tracks. "What are you talking about?"

"We're not taking you with us."

Ron's blood turned to ice. The scent of alcohol and vomit from the bathroom and his body was overwhelming and he fought back the urge to be sick again.

"You left us, remember?" Harry continued, his bright green eyes cold and unforgiving. "You know Hermione and I have been getting along splendidly without you. We even figured out how to destroy the locket." Harry sneered at his old friend like a snake about to devour a mouse. "Come on Ron, aren't you happy for us? We did it. Without you."

_Ron…_

Understanding hit Ron like a bolt of lighting. Suddenly he could see the whole set-up, but understanding didn't make him feel any better. "This isn't real. This can't be real. Harry doesn't look like that."

"What are you talking about?"

"Harry doesn't smile like a goddamn snake!"

The fake Harry chuckled to himself, kicking at Nikolai's threadbare carpet. "Very good Ronald. But if I'm not Harry, then what am I?" The muscles underneath Harry's face moved like he'd drank Polyjuice Potion. The red-head turned away to grab his wand from the coat on the bed. He held it in front of him with shaking hands as he watched in cold horror while his best friend's nose was replaced by two slits, his eyes turning from green to black.

_Ron…_

"You're that goddamn Horcrux aren't you?" Ron spat out. "Somehow you're still in my head."

"Somehow? Oh Ronald." the Harry-Snake tuted like he was talking to a small child. "You let me in. You've been keeping me, feeding me, allowing me to grow."

"That's not true."

"You were like a child, taking home a small lost dog. And now _I'm _your best friend."

"Liar!" Ron shot off a spell without thinking, but it went straight through the Harry-Snake and blasted a hole in Nikolai's door.

"He's finally lost it."

Ron's heart skipped a beat. He knew that voice; he would have recognized it even if a bomb went off next to his head. Slowly he turned around to see Hermione, beautiful, wonderful Hermione looking at him with the same face she'd make when he hadn't done his homework.

She smirked. "He's seeing people who aren't there, hearing voices, firing off random spells at thin air. It looks like a classic case of trauma-induced paranoia to me. Perhaps we'll send him off to St. Mungo's so the poor boy doesn't hurt himself."

_This isn't happening_, Ron thought to himself, his grip on his wand tightening. He could hear a commotion from down the stairs; someone was trying to get in.

"Well you've really done it now Ronald," the Harry-Snake said. "It's a good thing the old man seems to have forgotten his key."

"They're going to come in here and arrest you, you know," the Hermione in the mirror said in the same know-it-all voice Ron knew so well. "They'll take away your wand, and then you'll be stuck."

Ron's world was spinning as he fell to his knees. _I'm going crazy. I have to be. This can't be happening._ He tried to throw up but nothing came out, just dry heaves.

"You should probably run away while you still can," the Snake hissed, inspecting his nails. "Or. I have a better idea." He came over to Ron and put his arm around the other boy's shaking shoulders. "You could take that wand of yours and just end it right here. No more running away, no more indecisiveness, no more letting people down. It will all just go away."

For a brief second Ron considered what the Snake, who looked so much like his best friend, the person he trusted most in the world, had to say.

_RON._

But he still had some fighting spirit left. "Fuck you," he spat out, shoving himself away from the Snake and into the bed with a hard thud. He could hear the noise from downstairs getting louder; whoever was down there would appear any moment now. The Harry-Snake was laughing, a mutilated hissing chuckle that made his skin crawl. His ears were ringing and his breathing was heavy, but somewhere in the midst of all the noise Ron heard something heavy fall from the bed.

It was the Deluminator. It rolled away from him with a metallic clanks towards the Snake figure. Ron watched in morbid fascination as it rolled towards the monster, bumping against its foot. With a loud click the lid to the Deluminator flew open and suddenly everything went black.

For a moment Ron sat in the darkness, stunned by the abrupt lack of light and, most disturbingly, sound. It was like someone had turned off the world and the only thing in existence was the thud of his beating heart against his chest.

"Ron."

The teenager swung around to his right with a jump, searching in the darkness for the source of the familiar voice.

A little boy appeared in the blackness; his big head poked out of an oversized itchy looking sweater emblazoned with the letter "R". His face appeared dirty but Ron knew from experience that too many freckles could look like dirt sometimes. The little boy attempted to comb down his messy red-hair before smiling confidently at his teenage counterpart. "Hello."

_My god, is that what I sounded like? _Ron cleared his throat. "Hello."

The eleven year-old Ron grinned and stepped forward to outstretch his hand. "You forgot this."

Ron looked at the little boy with some apprehension; he'd just seen his best friend transform into a snake man, how did he know he could trust this particular figment of his imagination? _I didn't trust myself, _Nikolai had said to him last night, his old eyes tired and filled with grief. Ron gulped. _Who knows what might have happened if he had?_

The older boy reached out his hand to the younger one and the eleven year-old dropped something hard and cold into his palm. Ron looked down; it was a chess piece. A white knight.

The little boy stood back and looked the young man in the eye. "Don't worry about this mate. You know what you have to do."

Ron looked at the boy, then down at the chess piece. It felt heavy and reassuring, a reminder of something he'd forgotten a long time ago. He knew Weasley wasn't the King, but he'd decided on that dark night in the hidden caverns of Hogwarts that it was his job to be the White Knight.

He looked back up at the boy who was beginning to fade away into a bright white light. "Thank you," he said, and the last thing he saw before the boy left was a younger version of his own confident grin.

"Hey." Ron looked in front of him; Hermione. She was kneeling in front of him, her eyes bright and her lips pulled into a small smile.

"Hermione?" The young woman laughed lightly, the very sound of it making Ron smile himself. "Hermione, I've missed you so much."

"I've missed you too Ron," she said. "More than you know."

Already she was beginning to fade away into white light, and it made Ron's heart ache. He tried to reach out and hold her, but his fingers were just touching thin air. "Wait Hermione, please don't go."

"It's time for you to come back to us Ron." Hermione leaned forward and gently kissed him on the lips, and suddenly it was as though warm chocolate had been poured into his insides. Ron closed his eyes and let the sensation wash over him; all the aches and pains in his body disappeared like breath on a glass window. For the first time in a long time Ron felt whole.

When he opened his eyes his memory of the past few minutes was fuzzy. He remembered a snake trying to poison him, a white light that somehow made all the pain go away, and Hermione's voice in his ear. _Ron… _

He looked down to see a small plastic chess piece in his huge palm, a white knight, and he grasped it with a newfound conviction. Harry needed him, and somehow he knew exactly how to get to him.

He the crash of the door downstairs being broken in. "Stan!" Nikolai was yelling; it was probably the closest thing Ron had ever heard to a grizzly bear. "Stan!"

The teenage boy jumped up and grabbed his things and his wand. He stuffed the Deluminator in his coat pocket, still holding the chess piece with his other hand. There was no time to lose; he had to go now.

_But where?_ He gripped the chess piece tighter so that the horse's pointy ears cut into his skin. _Right, trust myself._

Nikolai's face appeared through the hole in the door, his expression the very definition of angry confusion. "What the hell happened to my door?" he growled loudly.

"I swear I'll make it up to you!" Ron yelled back. He threw up his wand and took one last deep breath before Disapparating into thin air.

Nikolai threw up his arms to shield his eyes from the bright flash of light and when he looked again the boy was gone. The other pub-crawlers in the stairwell asked Nikolai what had happened, but the old man was too stunned to say anything. Instead he opened his door cautiously and stepped inside. There was an empty glass in the bathroom sink, but other than that and the giant hole in the door there was no sign anyone had been there. The old man scratched his beard quizzically and turned back to his friends with a shrug. "He's gone."

Later that night a red-haired older man came into the pub and asked to speak to Nikolai. He said he was a member of the police force and he was called to investigate a disturbance. Was there anyway they could go to the old man's apartment so he could properly look around? Nikolai took him up the stairwell and showed him the damage, telling him all about the strange boy he'd played chess with.

"He had hair like yours," Nikolai said in a daze.

The investigator smiled sadly and thanked the old Russian for his help before pulling out his wand and performing all the necessary procedures. When Nikolai saw the man out, his door was fixed and he had a strong desire for a drink.

A year later Nikolai was in the hospital. Liver failure. Not that he'd been surprised, but it still hurt like hell.

On one particularly cold winter night, the kind that made Nikolai grateful for once that he was warm inside the godforsaken hospital instead of outside in the cold, a nurse knocked on his door. She'd brought him a gift from a friend; a thermos of rich hot chocolate that was so delicious it made his toes curl in delight. The note attached had no signature, but it did say "My mother's recipe."

* * *

Please review and let me know about any improvements I can make within the story and as a writer :)


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